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Hello fellow readers. Sorry, for the 7 day hiatus. I was fortunate to have a short family vacation in the hills of New Hampshire (U.S.A. for my friends across the pond). I’m now rested, retired the family truckster, back online, and ready to catch up.

Oh man, lot’s has happened in our world over the past week. Quick thoughts:

Rock Band 2 announcements galore

Guitar Hero World Tour announcements galore

E3 and a crazy amount of Xbox, PS3, and Wii announcements

More DLC for Rock Band released

Treo 800w (hey, I know I’m currently obsessed with Rock Band, but can’t forget about my old school readers.)

iPhone 3G….I heard a rumor that it was released. 🙂

Ok, although I only have enough time for this blog to be a part-time obsession, I have so much to write about. So, keep close by or make sure to add this blog to your RSS reader. I’m fully caffeinated and ready to write.

So, I just noticed, the folks at Wired have a sorta exclusive. The Xbox gear for Rock Band (Drums, guitars, mic) is slated to work on Activision’s upcoming Guitar Hero World Tour. That is HUGE news for the GH franchise. Since most fans of this type of game, likely already own drums and mics from Rock Band Special Edition, and are less than likely to fork over another ~$200 for the GH branded gear.

I have basically written off the GH franchise ( as you might be able to tell by the focus of this blog. Though, you know what……GH is now coming back on my radar.

A little history from me to you. I never owned any of the GH games. “Wha-wha-WHAT,” you say. That’s correct. In fact, I didn’t own a game system prior to the release and success of Rock Band. After playing RB for hours at a Best Buy, and then at a couple friends houses, I needed it. And it had to be on Xbox 360, so we could play on Xbox Live together.

So, why did I never get into Guitar Hero. Simple, I’m a drummer and singer. The RB drums are close enough to the real thing, that I’m actually practicing my drumming skills while gaming. Kind of a 2-fer-1, deal. Same thing with vocals on RB. For the guitar and bass parts, although they are fun….they aren’t like the real thing.

Ok, so you know my background. Now, back to RB vs. GH. If what Wired says is true, you can expect me to blog alot more about the upcoming GH World Tour (which between you and me, I have been reading a lot about, just not writing about it).

Here’s what Wired learned from Brian Bright of Activision: “Here’s how it’ll work. Speaking with Bright after the conference, I found out that the game’s five-button drum track, shown above center, will be compressed down to four inputs if a Rock Band drum controller is inserted.

There’s also a MIDI jack on the back of the drum kit, Bright said, which will allow gamers to play Guitar Hero with any electronic drum kit by simply plugging it into the controller. You can also hook up a second drum pedal if you want to play two bass drums.”

So, what are you thinking now? Do you own RB? Will you get RB2? (Of course you will). Will you NOW get GHWT? Will you get both games ($170 buh-bye)? Will you get new instruments?

What will get me to fork over $60 for GHWT, when I already have RB and guaranteed to get RB2. As of now, all features aside, and all hardware aside…….songs. If GHWT has a compelling enough setlist that I like to play, then I will get it. Though, it’s going to be VERY compelling with the 314 and counting (to date) known songs that will be playable once RB2 comes out.

This Tuesday, the weekly jam session is back! New theme, same time. Let’s do some classic rock in honor of the release of The Who DLC. There will be one piece of The Who DLC, so try to have it ready for jam time. NOTE: If you hate this set list, or do not plan to get the DLC, let me know…..I’ll adjust it. This is your jam session after all.

Before I post this weeks Jam Session theme, I want to see if there is interest from the community. I’m looking for any (and all) Xbox Livers that would be interested in a 4-8 song jam session tonight at 9:00 pm ET.

Hit me back with a comment to let me know if you are interested. Hint: If we are on, likely Classic Rock will play into the theme….and some of The Who DLC will be on the list.

So, you have two things to comment on:
1. Will you be on Xbox Live tonight at 9:00 PM ET for a Jam Session?
2. What Classic Rock songs do you want on the set list (feel free to include DLC too). If you want it and have it, I will download it too.

BTW, for anyone who knows me, you’ll understand why I put “The Wholigans” image on this post. For those who don’t know me, think of tonight as a The Who tribute. Long live The Wholigans!

The folks at EW (that’s Entertainment Weekly to us not in the know), are telling us that they know the final set list for Rock Band 2. So, I’ll bite…..let’s see it, and who told you? Well, it’s supposedly official and I hear that it was announced today at the annual E3 conference. So, here we go:

Oh the rumors just keep getting better. Now, for you young’ens, W. Axl Rose was a rock GOD in the 80’s and early 90’s. So popular, that teenagers would actually fly cross country, stumble through family friendly neighborhoods like Compton, CA and wait for 4 hours for the band to finish some jack and coke (not coca-cola) before taking the stage……just to see the man, the myth in the flesh.

Anyway, off the tangent, the latest Rock Band 2 rumor is making some noise that Axl Rose and his wanna be Guns N’ Roses cover band, is going to release some of their songs from Chinese Democracy (an album that has been in production for over 15 years, and costing 10’s of millions to complete). NOTE: I went to the Guns N’ Roses Chinese Democracy tour 4 years ago…..how messed up is that? I saw the tour for an album that STILL hasn’t been released. I must say, Axl’s pretend band is the best GNR cover band I have ever seen (sorry Midian, you come in a close second).

Sorry, another tangent. Anyway, I’d be most than excited to see 1, 2, or 85 GNR songs on Rock Band 2.

Today seems to be a fairly quiet day on the Rock Band front, or so I thought. This weeks DLC came out, we know…..Rush and Red Hot Chili Peppers. That’s cool, but doesn’t get me all fired up. The Rock Band 2 rumors continue to get a little more detailed and then a little more blurry, but nothing I haven’t heard much before now.

Then, after scouring Google and the Xbox 360 boards…..I realized that I had too much time on my hands and wound up at Nintendo Wii Fan Boy. And, looky here, the rumor mill got me excited enough to write a post.

So, basically the Nintendo geeks are claiming to have a supposed final list of the Rock Band 2 songs and in order of difficulty. “So what” you say, “we’ve talking about this already”. Granted, we have, but I see some new rumored songs that got me all excited once again.

Since, I don’t have time to blab on, I’ll just list the interesting ones that the Wii Fan Boys are talking about.
“Cowboys from Hell” by Pantera
“Hot for Teacher” by Van Halen

EDITORIAL:
Last night, I confirmed something. Playing some of the heavier songs on drums expert, I realized that the drum parts are just like the original song. There’s a problem with that. Some of the heavier songs (i.e. Disturbed “Into the Fire”) has a lot of double bass drums parts, but there is only one bass drum pedal on the Rock Band kit. So, I ask, WTF?!

I’ve been drumming since I could walk, and love Rock Band and how they have kept the expert levels authentic to the original songs. But, they are expecting people to have killer calfs with lightening speed. It’s a great exercise and good to practice double bass with one foot, but not true to real playing.

The folks at Harmonix (or a 3rd party) need to come up with a second bass drum pedal for those heavier songs. I’d buy it in a heartbeat.

You know, as an electronics guy, maybe I’ll build one my self. Do something like buy a second Rock Band pedal and solder the wires of the two together. Really shouldn’t be that hard, and should work quite good.

I know people are modding their Rock Band peripherals everywhere. So, before I go into the basement and start shredding my kit, let me know if you’ve seen this done somewhere.

Anyway, from a lover of the game and a HUGE fan of the heavy DLC that comes out, let’s get the drum set to be accurate like a real metal kit. I’m fine with the current layout of the pads, but that extra kick pedal would make all the difference in the world.

Has anyone noticed that you can pre-order Rock Band 2 (both Special Edition and Game Only) from Game Stop? Based on Game Stop, it’s going to ship October 30. $189.99 for Special Edition (games, drums, guitar, mic, etc) and $59.99 for game only. So, if this is right, the Special Edition price is going up. Yikes!! What new hardware will we get? I know the guitar has a new paint job, but that’s all I’ve seen confirmed for hardware updates. I’d love a better drum set, but I’m not going to dish out $200 after taxes for it.

What, what, what!!? After looking closer, the game only version (you know the $59.99 version) is listed as shipping September 30. Ok, so we get the new software and (more importantly) new songs at the end of September, but the hardware will take a little tweaking but still make it out for the holidays. Fine by me. I really just want some Linkin Park anyway. And online World Tour (Pabel, here we come).

One other thing of note, Xbox 360 is the only platform listed. So, once again the best game console gets the exclusive release of the best game sequel. Yes, I’m a fanboy of both.

I’ll buy just the game, and upgrade hardware as needed (or as I break it on same grand finale masterpiece).